Best Service Request Software
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PRODUCTS
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BUYER'S GUIDE
Buyer's Guide
By Kriti Sahay, Technical Writer at SelectHub
Digital adoption and expansion are at an all-time high. According to a 2021 report by Research and Markets, the market size of digital transformation is expected to grow from $521.5 billion to $1247.5 billion by 2026, at a CAGR of 19.1%. The digital boom has extensively transformed business workflows across all sectors and has overburdened the IT infrastructure, leading to a spike in service requests.
To survive the increasing demand for customer support, a reliable service request software is essential.
Service request software helps you establish resilient, adaptive and efficient enterprise models that enhance customer and employee experiences. In this buyer's guide, we'll discuss service request software, key features to keep in mind and how to choose the best solution for your organization.
Executive Summary
- Service requests are formal requests that your help desk receives from customers regarding a product or service. Examples include requests to access an account or resource, renewal requests and requests for information.
- Service request software helps organizations handle several customer requests quickly and efficiently.
- It assists in managing the entire request lifecycle, starting from the time a user submits a ticket until it is fulfilled.
What Is Service Request Software?
Service request software helps organizations simplify the fulfillment of service requests. It assists help desk teams in managing the complete lifecycle of customer service requests, from submission to resolution.
Service request software also helps improve customer experience and company transparency. Customers can easily raise a service request, view their request status and understand how much time its resolution will take.
On the internal side, performance reports help you get a better view of your customer support teams’ performance and allocate resources to different departments based on business priorities and workloads.
These platforms are also essential to maintaining mature IT service management (ITSM), helping businesses determine the current state of their IT infrastructure and analyze appropriate metrics for improvement.
Service request software manages more than customer requests. Many options also offer the following internal management tools:
- Incident management, which prepares you for contingencies and unplanned scenarios that could interrupt routine workflows and business/user activities.
- Problem management, which helps identify and resolve underlying problems.
- Change management, which authorizes agents to make changes to services per customer requests, and monitors these changes to ensure they’ve addressed the problem and don’t cause any further issues.
Primary Benefits
1. Flexibility
A modern, 100% SaaS service request software allows you to log in from any browser and work from anywhere. Agents can address customer requests anytime, expediting resolutions.
McKinsey found that, when offered the chance to work remotely, 87% of employees take it. Flexible work opportunities are attractive to potential hires and greatly expands your talent pool. Additionally, it also improves staff retention and reduces staff stress levels, as a recent MIT study found.
2. Real-Time Insights
You can gain insight into employee performance with reports on key metrics, like average request handling time, first call resolution, percentage of unattended calls and time spent per call. Easily allocate human resources to different departments based on business priorities and workloads.
Good quality data is essential to the growth of your business. Having the right KPIs and metrics allows you to track exactly where your service desk is lacking and how you can improve it.
3. Efficiency
A 2022 study by Salseforce found that customers want to interact with someone immediately after contacting customer service. To meet these rising customer expectations, you need an efficient ITSM system.
Service request systems allow you to streamline your customer support by connecting customers to the most appropriate agents for their queries, yielding better results in faster turnaround times.
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Key Features & Functionality
Actionable Catalog | Provide customers with a drop-down list of all standard services they can request, along with descriptions of what the services are and the status of active requests. It also groups services by category: information requests, MAC requests and password reset requests. |
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Service Request Records | Reduce errors by assigning a unique identification code to each service request. You can also record all the request-related information and automatically update it as the ticket progresses. |
Service Request Routing | Route tickets to the appropriate agent, depending on the selected request category or sub-category. This feature allows multiple individuals to work on a service request, leading to a faster resolution. For instance, a service request for a new laptop involves an agent to record the request, an analyst to review it and a technician to build it to the necessary specifications. This feature simplifies collaboration between all parties involved through every step. |
Progress Tracking and Escalation | Reduce the occurrence of redundant calls by allowing customers to track the progress of their service requests. Agents can escalate service-level breaches automatically to upper management so they can be prioritized. |
Reporting | The software reports all the information it captures during the request lifecycle. Use this data to identify potential issues and improve the process of dealing with customer tickets. Generate insightful reports about the number of open and closed tickets, rejected service requests and request categories. |
Request Fulfillment and Closure | Inform customers about completed requests with automated notifications. Agents can also refuse a request and close a ticket because of insufficient budget, unavailability of the service requested or incorrect authorization levels. The software differentiates between these types of closures. |
Software Comparison Strategy
Although most service request software is fully customizable, customization often comes at a higher cost than baseline software. Most products come with features that are useful to any business. To pare down and find the best product for your business, it's important to determine your specific needs by setting requirements
To help choose the right solution for your organization, refer to our free in-depth comparison report. We compare top vendors across a wide range of capabilities, like automation, reporting, progress tracking and escalation, custom templates, incident management and file storage.
Cost & Pricing Considerations
Cost varies depending on your deployment strategy, the addition of modules and add-ons, and the number and type of user licenses you need. You can also consider payment plans or packages to lessen the upfront cost.
Some additional aspects that can affect cost are:
- Training: If the vendor doesn’t offer free onboarding and training resources, you may have to pay separately for them. Training agents to properly utilize software is critical for ensuring a superior customer experience. You may need to invest in your own training management system to address this.
- Maintenance and support: Be sure to ask the vendor if they offer free maintenance and support or if it will cost you extra down the line. Also ask about version upgrades. While cloud software subscriptions usually include maintenance and upgrades, on-premise software generally doesn’t so you may have to pay additional fees.
- Initial implementation: While cloud software can be easily implemented online, on-premise software tends to be a bit more involved. Be sure to ask whether the vendor offers installation support or if you’ll need to make your own arrangements.
The Most Popular Service Request Software
Kickstart your software search with our top picks for some of the most popular service request software on the market.
Freshdesk
Freshdesk is a popular ITSM solution that simplifies ticketing with a wide range of customization options. This cloud-based platform enables customers and agents to manage information and adhere to strict protocols for data security. It offers various field service modules, multiple service channels, query resolution and automatic routing and updating of support tickets.
Agent leaderboard. Source
Zendesk for Service
Zendesk for Service is a well-known support solution that allows users to manage the entire service request lifecycle by testing, verifying and triaging tickets. It uses essential ticket fields to track customer grievances and communicate the status of requests. It supports communication across multiple channels and offers a centralized hub for monitoring team performance metrics, SLAs and KPIs. For more information, see our Ultimate Zendesk Review.
Customer spotlight box. Source
Salesforce Service Cloud
Salesforce Cloud Service is an IT ticketing management software that helps ITSM teams diagnose incidents and route tickets appropriately. It offers quick and personalized virtual services via all communication modules, including phone, email, SMS and web chat. Some features include case management, automation, customization, a knowledge base and CTI integration.
Desktop and mobile dashboard preview. Source
Questions To Ask
Selecting a service request solution is a complex task for every organization: what works best for one may not be the right choice for another. Although thousands of vendors have made their products available on the market, each offers different features.
Before starting your search, we recommend asking yourself these guiding questions:
- How will this software meet my organization’s needs?
- Which is better, on-site or cloud deployment?
- Are there requirements specific to my industry?
- How will this tool help my organization grow?
- Who will use the platform regularly?
Ask potential vendors these questions about the software to help make an informed decision:
- Do you offer any training to support user adoption?
- What is the turnaround time of your customer support? Do you offer 24/7, multi-lingual support?
- How many contact profiles can be stored?
- How do ticket workflows work?
- How well does it integrate with other BI tools?
Next Steps
Managing IT service requests is a complex task, but customer-focused service request software can help alleviate the burden. The right solution streamlines and strengthens your service delivery, which means you’ll have happier customers.
Get started by using our free online software selection tool or working with our experts to review your requirements, so we can help find the solution that’s right for you.
Product Comparisons
- Freshdesk vs. Salesforce Service Cloud
- Salesforce Service Cloud vs. Zendesk for Service
- Zendesk for Service vs. Freshdesk
Additional Resources
Products found for Service Request Software
Zendesk
Zendesk For Service is a scalable platform offering streamlined customer and sales support. Agents can resolve problems efficiently, and track and prioritize support tickets. Omnichannel support allows users to centralize customer interactions across phone, chat, email and more. Its built-in intelligent routing reduces resolution time by automating ticketing queues and ensuring an appropriate customer-to-agent fit. Customizable, shareable and pre-built dashboards help users gain actionable insights through real-time data. Teams can leverage the integrated knowledge base management tools to empower customers to resolve issues by themselves. AI-powered bots optimize engagement by providing 24/7 support, answering FAQs, collecting information, delivering chat transcripts and auto-filling ticket fields. Its other offerings include a self-service portal, reporting and analytics, an IT service desk and more.To explore other popular solutions offered by Zendesk, visit our Zendesk company page.
Splunk
Splunk is an affordable analytics solution ideal for businesses of all sizes. It offers a number of common analytics features, including dashboards, plugins, automatic data enrichment, monitoring and alerts. It also provides unique features such as wide-sourcing of data, intel into different company functions and more. With cloud and on-premise deployment available, as well as a lightweight free version, it can serve a range of needs.
ServiceNow
ServiceNow offers a cloud-based suite for managing digital business workflows that ensure improved employee productivity, cost optimization and enhanced customer experiences. IntegrationHub minimizes integration costs and increases IT efficiency. Its other offerings include a UI builder, AI-supported search, process optimization, chatbots and more.
Aspect
Aspect is a contact management solution that supports global inbound and outbound communications across voice, email, SMS and other methods. It improves operational efficiency, ensures compliance and delivers satisfactory customer experiences. Other offerings include inbound and outbound voice support, omnichannel agent, digital self-service and more.
Streak CRM
Streak CRM is built into Gmail, allowing users to manage common sales tasks directly from their inbox. It facilitates pipeline management so users can track leads, follow up, collaborate and close deals. Three different pricing tiers make it useful for both individuals who need basic functions and companies that require more advanced capabilities. In addition to managing a pipeline, users can also leverage it to manage projects, foster business relationships, run fundraisers, provide customer support and execute other projects that require tracking details.
Intercom
Intercom is a conversational platform that personalizes messaging throughout the customer journey using customer, company and behavioral data. It offers chatbots, marketing campaigns, self-service functions, proactive tours and more. Collaborative inboxes, reporting and automated workflows help users interact with customers across all channels. It integrates with out-of-the-box modules to automate actions and sync data and allows users to build their setups based on business needs. Businesses can see who uses their products and communicate with customers via targeted, behavior-driven emails and in-app messages.
Freshdesk
Freshdesk is a cloud-based customer service solution that ensures increased satisfaction and engagement. It simplifies ticketing with customization options for agent roles, ticket forms, portals and more. Users can manage identity and information access for improved data security. It offers field service modules that include omnichannel customer engagement, quick query resolution, automatic appointment management and a map view that lets users track dispatches in real time. Android and iOS support allow field employees to plan, monitor and track appointments, updates and customer communication conveniently. Its other offerings include widget customization, scheduled and customized reports, intelligent ticket assignment and more.
Bitrix24
Bitrix24 facilitates the execution of the customer journey. It supplies organizations with tools for marketing, sales and customer service activities such as lead generation, marketing automation, campaign management and call center support.It comes with a free edition for companies with less advanced needs or a smaller budget. Deployment is available in the cloud and on-premise. It’s suitable for smaller businesses as well as enterprises with up to 50,000 employees.
ConnectWise Manage
ConnectWise Manage is a PSA tool for businesses in the IT sector that are seeking to develop consistency across the organization. It also enables users to manage accounts and other service-oriented tasks efficiently. The program contains centralized data as well as account information to increase internal visibility and to reduce duplicate work.It aims to streamline elements such as billing, client communications, procurement and project management. It’s available to IT businesses of all sizes and can be deployed either on-premise or cloud-based.
Spiceworks
Designed for IT professionals, Spiceworks is a cloud-based platform that offers on-the-go ticket management for Android and iOS devices. It offers omnichannel customer support while monitoring IT incidents and tracking updates. Other significant attributes include a customizable user portal and seamless integration with Active Directory for automated ticket management.
LiveChat
LiveChat is a customer service chat app that allows companies of all sizes to more easily connect with website visitors and supports the efforts of sales departments as well. It offers capabilities for complete communication and measurement via chat, agent monitoring, ticketing, e-commerce, engagement and reporting. It can be deployed across multiple websites and used on mobile, desktop and web-enabled devices.
Agile CRM
Agile CRM is an all-in-one cloud platform that enables companies to handle all activities and tasks across the customer lifecycle. With integrated modules for marketing, sales and service, it provides capabilities such as contact management, a deal pipeline, lead scoring, project management, email marketing and campaigns, service automation, and live chat.Targeted primarily at small businesses, it allows users to maintain visibility into contacts, boost results with sales enablement, engage web users and deliver comprehensive support. Free and premium versions are available.
HelpDesk
HelpDesk provides customer support capabilities to businesses of different sizes that allow them to deliver quality customer experiences and increase satisfaction and engagement while maximising sales and issues resolution. It allows users to streamline workflows with centralized ticketing, which simplifies customer support activities. Its other major offerings include automation, team collaboration, analytics and reporting, personalization, and more.
Zoho Desk
Zoho Desk provides improved customer experiences by managing and prioritizing customer interactions across multiple communication channels. Its AI-powered tools help deliver exceptional customer service. Its other significant capabilities and services such as ticketing management, issue tracking, a live-chat widget and many others.
Help Scout
Help Scout is an online platform company providing an email-based knowledge base, customer support platform and embeddable search widget. Users can work across departments and seamlessly manage multiple applications from one account. It eliminates duplicate tasks and keeps everyone on the same page with tools such as collaboration and automation. Some essential capabilities include reporting and statistics, customizable branding, live chat and multi-channel communication.
Kayako
Kayako is a fully integrated, cloud-based customer service platform that helps simplify customer interactions. Agents can offer 24/7 support through various communication platforms, including email, Facebook and Twitter, and in multiple languages. It also offers self-service options, a visual timeline of customer interactions, integrations and more.
GreenRope
GreenRope, a cloud-based CRM software, consolidates and optimizes email marketing, social media, sales, event and project management simultaneously. It bridges the gap between sales and marketing to make data and processes easily accessible and transparent. Its all-in-one operations modules simplify business processes to deliver optimized omnichannel customer experiences.
Track-It
Designed for small and medium-sized businesses, Track-It offers an centralized, holistic view of incidents, problems and change requests from customers. It automates and streamlines IT support processes to ensure faster issue resolution and improved customer experiences. Its major attributes include a self-service web portal, a mobile app, change management, ticketing management and more.
LiveHelpNow
LiveHelpNow provides omnichannel support solutions to make customer interactions smooth and convenient for agents. It offers real-time customer service communications over email, Facebook messenger, live chat and SMS. Customers can benefit from its self-help knowledge base. Other notable attributes include ticketing support, instant language translation, analytics and reporting, tracking and more.
BeyondTrust
BeyondTrust offers administrative and remote assistance to help businesses standardize technical aspects of support services. Identity management and group policies are available for multiple-agent teams. Custom integrations with CRM, ITSM, SIEM and others are also available.
HappyFox
HappyFox is a ticket management and customer support software that integrates with the user's website and email accounts to collate customer requests. It helps agents organize, track and respond more effectively. They can also assign emails to appropriate persons. The ticketing lets agents solve customers' issues productively while streamlining the customer support workflow. It also has a built-in knowledge base, end-user support portal and community forum.
FreshService
Freshservice is a cloud-based IT service management offering from Freshworks that tracks and manages IT and digital assets. It also provides an IT service desk, reporting, IT asset management and IT project management. It maintains records of contracts, hardware, software and other assets from the time of purchase to the point of expiration. It also helps automate and streamline processes through the lifespan of an asset. Suitable for companies of any size, it can assist financial, HR, marketing and facility teams.
Salesforce Service Cloud
Salesforce Service Cloud offers omnichannel customer support ranging from emails and live chat to voice complaints. It automates procedures and keeps a check on the budget for customer support. With a 360-degree view of customers, it helps improve efficiency. Integrations with MailChimp, Dropbox, GetFeedback and others are available. Its other offerings include drag-and-drop customization of workflows, creation of a public Q A, chatbots and more.
Front
Front is a customer communication platform offering tailor-made services at scale. With the simplicity of the email inbox combined with the insights and automation of CRM, it helps agents work to provide world-class support and send professional replies faster. It allows users to keep conversations organized across channels while maintaining a personal touch, efficiency and quality.
TeamSupport
TeamSupport is a B2B customer support solution allowing organizations to build stronger customer relationships through ticket management, omnichannel experience and more. It streamlines support issues and facilitates seamless internal team collaboration while allowing agents to deliver and help customers consistently. Its capabilities enable users to consolidate customer interactions while getting deep insights into clients’ sentiments and identifying critical opportunities and issues.
LiveAgent
LiveAgent is an online communication platform that supports personalized, multilingual customer service. It provides in-suite and standalone offerings for live chat, online self-service portals, ticket management, change and license management, and more. It offers all-in-one helpdesk support by combining all communication channels, including email, live chat, phone calls and social media, in a single company inbox. LiveAgent offers additional services through third-party companies to provide CRM, including sales and marketing automation. Users can analyze helpdesk performance and generate multiple reports to reward high-performing support agents and track customer satisfaction.
Jitbit
JitBit is a multilingual support system with basic capabilities such as ticket routing, a knowledge base, ticket filters and categorization, canned replies, an auto-responder, reporting, file attachments and asset tracking. It has native iPhone and Android programs for tablets and smartphones. The grid view shows the status of all ongoing and new cases. It also offers automation rules to define custom actions triggered by certain events. Group, merge, assign, categorize or tag tickets and add tags such as, "review," "feature request," or more.
Comm100
Comm100 is a live chat solution that offers real-time, personalized customer engagement. It supports multilingual services with a flexible ticketing and messaging system, automated chatbots, a self-serve knowledge base and security measures for data protection. The product connects via third-party integrations such as CRMs, eCommerce, social media and website content management channels with a systematic API. Live chat lets users engage with customers in real time using text, routing, audio, video, co-browsing, file transfer, auto-translation and more. Reports help evaluate team performance, chat expertise and overall service efficiency.
HubSpot Service Hub
Hubspot Service Hub is a customer service software offering flexible support, seamless onboarding and strengthening relationships with clients. It delivers end-to-end and efficient service improving customer satisfaction first-time resolution rates. Its capabilities include conversational tools, knowledge base functionality, help desk automation, reporting, client feedback surveys and more. These functionalities are CRM-powered, providing businesses a unified view of each interaction.
Agendize
Agendize is a versatile appointment scheduling and customer engagement platform used by businesses across various industries. It offers a range of key features, including robust appointment scheduling, multi-channel integration, and automation, which streamline operations and enhance customer experiences. Users appreciate its user-friendly interface and customization options, along with responsive customer support. Agendize is known for its cost-efficiency and mobile accessibility, making it accessible to a broad user base. Users believe that Agendize holds its own against similar products, citing its strengths in appointment scheduling and multi-channel integration. However, some note limitations in terms of customization and pricing when compared to other offerings in the market. Pros Efficient Scheduling Detailed Analytics Client Management Cons Limited Customization Integration Challenges Lack of Advanced Features
Talisma
Talisma is a sales and marketing technology solution that adds value to customer engagement and increases productivity. It helps companies empower, enable and engage with their customers through Formal Technical Review (FTR) to deliver quality-controlled activities. Users can identify customer characteristics and utilize upselling and cross-selling for maximum success. It also offers industry-specific domains, cloud deployment, integrated lead management, flexible business modeling, domain management and more to make digital marketing easy.
Teamwork Desk
Teamwork Desk is a ticketing system that manages customer questions in a central location while ensuring exceptional customer experience. It offers all the help desk features required to exceed customers’ expectations and answer questions with context. Some of the unique capabilities deliver a more personal and productive response and improve transparency across teams include customer history, customizable branding, document storage, email management, email template and interaction tracking.
EngageBay
EngageBay is a customer relationship management platform that helps businesses engage and convert leads, acquire customers and nurture existing relationships. Key features include SMS marketing, automation, web analytics and live chat.
CRMnext
CRMNext leverages integrated technology to create an easy-to-use interface for financial institutions. It simplifies work, drives growth and delivers results with features such as sales force automation, service management, lead management, forecasting, an autoflow designer and workflow management.It also provides real-time integration, a business decision engine, sales planning, cross-selling intelligence, machine learning, analytics and more. It’s easily customizable and suitable for users without much technical knowledge. SaaS, private cloud and on-premise deployment are available.
SALESmanago
SALESmanago is a complete AI-powered solution that delivers configurable, personalized experiences across a range of native and integrated marketing execution channels. It accomplishes this by combining advanced analytics and AI automation. Users can deliver enhanced customer experiences and improve metrics and KPIs. Capabilities include web push, website personalization, social proof, live chat, predictive analytics, advertising, a data management platform, A/B/X testing and optimization, loyalty programs and more.
BMC Helix ITSM
BMC Helix ITSM is a predictive service and asset management suite that offers an inherent mobile-first client experience. It helps product managers improve organizational productivity, shrink overall service management costs and more, all through a single source. It offers service management modules that use cognitive automation capabilities to transform ITSM effective principles from NextGen Remedy. It can be deployed via the cloud.
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